When Marlee Matlin’s star was unveiled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in May 2009, her husband did not stand back for the photographs. He crouched down on the pavement and took the picture himself.
That moment, documented in Getty Images records from the ceremony, says more about Kevin Grandalski than any interview he has never given. For over three decades, he has been present for nearly every significant chapter in one of Hollywood’s longest marriages without once making himself the subject of it.
He is 61 years old, a retired police officer from Burbank, California, and the man Marlee Matlin has been married to since August 1993. Here is what is on the record.
Table of Contents
Kevin Grandalski: At a Glance
| Full name | Kevin Grandalski |
| Date of birth | February 13, 1965 |
| Age (2026) | 61 |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Retired police officer |
| Department | Burbank Police Department, California |
| Years of service | ~29.7 years |
| Married | August 29, 1993 |
| Spouse | Marlee Matlin |
| Children | Sara Rose, Brandon Joseph, Tyler Daniel, Isabelle Jane |
| Grandchild | Brooklyn Rose (born April 2024) |
A Police Officer Who Learned Sign Language in College
Kevin studied criminal justice at a California State University. While working toward that degree, he took American Sign Language as his foreign language requirement. It was a practical academic choice at the time, nothing more.
After graduating, he joined the Burbank Police Department, a standalone force that operates independently from the LAPD and serves the city of Burbank in Los Angeles County. He stayed for just under 30 years.
That ASL class he sat through in college would turn out to be the detail that changed his life, though he had no way of knowing that at the time.
How Kevin Grandalski and Marlee Matlin First Met
Their first encounter was not the one that started the relationship.
It was June 1991. Marlee was filming Reasonable Doubts, her NBC legal drama in which she played an assistant district attorney, on location in Los Angeles. Kevin was working a traffic detail near the set. When he first saw her, he had no idea she was a well-known actress. Someone on set had to fill him in.
Nothing came of that first meeting. Around seven months later, in early 1992, they crossed paths again on set.
Marlee later told the Los Angeles Times exactly what happened the second time:
“I became friends with a lot of cops, and one day I got to work and saw my friend in uniform and I went up and gave him a big hug and he stiffened up and I realized it was the wrong cop. Because of course they all look the same with their moustaches. And my friend sees this and goes, ‘Stay away from him.’ ‘No, no. You think I’m going to listen to you?’ And the rest is history.”
In a 2018 interview with Oregon Jewish Life, she put it more plainly: “I saw him, and I was hooked. It must have been the uniform.”
Some background that adds context: Marlee had grown up watching police procedurals including The Streets of San Francisco, Mannix, and CHiPs. She had studied criminal justice herself and seriously considered a career in law enforcement before acting took over. Reasonable Doubts executive producer Robert Singer confirmed her longstanding fascination with police work to People Magazine. When asked about that old ambition years later, her answer was brief: “Marrying one is better.”
Kevin’s ASL, picked up years earlier in a college classroom, meant he could talk with her directly from the start, without an interpreter in between. That removed weeks of friction that might otherwise have come first.
The Proposal and the 1993 Wedding
Kevin proposed on February 13, 1993, his own birthday, with a three-carat diamond ring.
The wedding was August 29, 1993, and the venue was a deliberate choice.
Not a hotel. Not a destination. The front lawn of actor Henry Winkler’s home in Los Angeles.
Winkler had been a surrogate father to Marlee since she was 12 years old. After her painful and, as she would later describe in her 2009 memoir I’ll Scream Later, abusive relationship with actor William Hurt, Marlee had lived at the Winkler family home for roughly two years while she rebuilt her life. That house was the place she most associated with safety.
Henry Winkler said of holding the ceremony there: “There was no other place for her to get married, except in our yard, in her home away from home.”
About the ceremony:
- Conducted by both a rabbi and a priest, reflecting that Marlee is Jewish and Kevin is not
- Vows were exchanged in American Sign Language, per People Magazine
- Marlee explained the interfaith arrangement in Oregon Jewish Life: “He’s not Jewish, but I believe that we can share both our beliefs in a household together. We celebrate both holidays, and we were married by both a rabbi and a priest on the front lawn at Henry Winkler’s house.”
Their 1993 wedding footage appears in the 2025 documentary Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore.
Kevin Grandalski’s Children and Grandchild
Kevin and Marlee have four children:
| Name | Date of Birth |
|---|---|
| Sara Rose Grandalski | January 19, 1996 |
| Brandon Joseph Grandalski | ~2000 |
| Tyler Daniel Grandalski | ~2002 |
| Isabelle Jane Grandalski | December 26, 2003 |
All four were raised with both English and American Sign Language from early childhood. Brandon was reportedly trilingual by age four, communicating in English, Spanish, and ASL, according to a Hands and Voices family profile.
The couple experienced a miscarriage in December 1998, documented in IMDB’s verified records.
On religion: Kevin and Marlee raised the children in an interfaith household and let each child make their own decisions on faith as they grew up. None of the four have had a bar or bat mitzvah.
In late April 2024, daughter Sara welcomed Brooklyn Rose, making Kevin and Marlee first-time grandparents. By November 2024, Brooklyn had already signed her first word in ASL. Marlee filmed it and posted the video to Instagram: “Brooklyn is signing her first sign!!! MILK! SO HAPPY TO HAVE CAUGHT IT ON VIDEO!”
Is Kevin Grandalski Deaf? Setting the Record Straight
No. Kevin Grandalski is not deaf.
He is a hearing person who learned American Sign Language during his college years as a foreign language requirement, not because of any hearing impairment. The family uses ASL as a shared language because Marlee has been deaf since she was 18 months old. Their children were raised bilingually in spoken English and sign language.
The claim that Kevin is also deaf has spread across dozens of low-quality websites, copied without any sourcing. Guideposts, one of the earliest reliable publications to profile Kevin specifically, confirmed in a 2002 piece that he learned ASL in college to fulfill a language requirement, years before he met anyone in the Deaf community.
Kevin Grandalski’s Retirement and Life in 2026
Kevin retired from the Burbank Police Department around 2017. Marlee posted a retirement tribute on Instagram alongside a photo of the two holding his shadow box from the Burbank Police Officers Association:
“Very proud wife of a retired police officer who just received his shadow box given by the Burbank Police Officers Association.”
She tagged the post #29.7years and #BPD, confirming the length of his service.
Since then, he has stayed almost entirely out of the public record. Over the years he attended the 80th Academy Awards in February 2008, Marlee’s Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony in May 2009, the LA Times Festival of Books in April 2009, and the Sardi’s portrait unveiling for her Broadway debut in 2015. He was at every one of those moments. He just never sought recognition for being there.
The 2025 documentary “Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore”, directed by Shoshannah Stern, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on January 23, 2025, and was released theatrically on June 20, 2025, through Kino Lorber. It brought renewed public attention to Marlee’s full story, including her marriage and family with Kevin.
On his 60th birthday, February 13, 2025, Marlee wrote on Instagram:
“It has been awesome celebrating him for the last 33 years and I look forward to another 33 plus years too. Life with him and our four children plus a granddaughter has been nothing but a true blessing.”
Kevin Grandalski has never added a word to that.
Sources: People Magazine, Guideposts (2002), Oregon Jewish Life (2018), Los Angeles Times, IMDB, Parade (June 2025), The Forward (June 2025), BroadwayWorld, Getty Images, UPI, Hands and Voices, CBS News, Kino Lorber.
